Look first at what a freedom of information request has revealed. Five Hackney council officers have six-figure salaries, and between them the council's 10 highest earners were paid more than £1m in the last financial year. Now ask yourself why it should be necessary to force a public body to reveal what its senior executives earn. Should that not be public knowledge anyway?
The salaries were revealed in the Hackney Gazette after a local campaign group, the taxpayers' alliance, made the FoI Act requests. A Gazette reporter tells me that the council have grown more secretive about salaries, even removing pay scales from recruitment adverts for senior staff.
For the record, Hackney council's chief executive, Penny Thompson, was paid £164,839, just £22,000 less than the prime minister. The other high earners were director of housing Steven Tucker (£126,000); director of customer and corporate services Gillian Steward (£123,000); director of finance Timothy Shields and director of community services Kim Wright (£120,000 each).
I'm not suggesting for a moment that these people are not worth the money - only the people of Hackney will know that - but there is no possible reason to keep senior town hall salaries secret. The lack of transparency among Britain's bureaucrats is the reason we, the people, need the freedom of information act.
